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THE STATE (5 F THE COUNTBY: 


1 




A 






DISCOURSE 






PREACHED IN THE 






1 ! 

FEDERAL STREET MEETINGHOUSE IN BOSTON, 




ON 






SUNDAY, JUNE 8, 1856. 






BY EZRA S. GANNETT. 






^ublisi)el) b$ jl^equest. 






BOSTON: 




CROSBY, NICHOLS, & COMPANY, 






111, Washington Street. 






1856. 














THE STATE OF THE COUNTRY 



'/3 



DISCOURSE 



PRF.ACHET) IX THK 



FEDERAL STREET MEETINGHOUSE IN BOSTON, 



SUNDAY, JUNE 8, 1856. 



BY EZRA S. GANNETT. 



IBublisJjeli 1)2 SElcquEst. 



BOSTON: 
CROSBY, NICHOLS, & COMPANY, 

111, Washington Street. 

1856. 



v:> 



£4-5 1 
.^3 



BOSTON: 

PRINTi;n BY JOHN "WILSON AND SON, 

22, PcnooL Strf.f.t. 






DISCOURSE. 



ISAIAH, LIX. 1, 2. 

THE lord's hand IS NOT SHORTENED, THAT IT CANNOT SAVE; NEITHER HIS 
EAR HEAVY, THAT IT CANNOT HEAR: BUT YOUR INIQUITIES HAVE SEPAKATED 
BETWEEN YOU AND YOUK GOD. 



There are times when speech is a duty, and times 
when silence is a virtue. There are times when, if 
one gives expression to the feeling with which his 
heart is burthened, he will be moved to say what his 
cooler judgment might not approve; and times when 
the calmest judgment forbids a suppression of the 
indignant or sorrowful feeling with which the breast 
labors. When we met here a fortnight ago, I was 
glad that the solemnities of the approaching week 
suggested a topic which drew our thoughts away 
from the painful facts of which it might then have 
been difficult to speak without transgressing the 
boundaries of Christian discussion. And, on the last 
Sunday, the associations to which we are accustomed 
to yield ourselves kept our view fixed on the great 



Sufferer. Through these two weeks, the facts to 
which I allude have lost none of their mournful sig- 
nificance, although the intense feeling which they at 
first excited may have settled into a more deliberate 
estimation of their character. It seems to me, that 
at this moment a voice should come from the sanc- 
tuaries of religion, addressing itself to the exigencies 
of the period. If only political interests were impe- 
rilled or involved, the sanctuaries of religion should 
not be disturbed by the intrusion of themes foreign 
from the purpose to which they are devoted. But, in 
the present state of our country, every interest dear to 
man, — the progress of civilization, the well-being of 
society, the fundamental principles of righteousness, 
the vital elements of character, the reality of moral dis- 
tinctions, the meaning of life ; all that the pulpit is 
erected to explain or enforce ; the value of the gos- 
pel as a law, and its efficacy as an influence, — all 
these are brought within the scope of the inquiry now 
on every one's lips. What shall be done'? That 
question does not simply ask, What shall patriots do 1 
or what shall republicans do ? or what shall Ameri- 
cans do ? using these, not as party names, but in their 
better and broader sense. It compels us to consider 
what Christians should do. And to this inquiry, 
drawing its proper answer from the Bible and the 
gospel, I reply. Repent and pray. This is the time 
to think of God ; the time to humble ourselves before 
Him, for we all need his forgiveness ; the time to 



seek from Him the wisdom and the help which He 
alone can give, and without which I see in the future 
only a history that it makes one sick at heart to 
regard as even possible. 

It ought not, perhaps, to surprise us, that, under 
the exasperation of feeling which no one is ashamed 
to confess, so little has been said of our dependence 
on God; a dependence which, as we look backward, 
must remind us of obligation that no neglect of ours 
can annul, and, as we look onward, opens to us the 
only trust to which we can retreat from our fears. 
Yet is not our perilous condition a result which we 
have induced 1 The present is but the maturity of 
the past ; and, if shame and anxiety fill our hearts, 
while the cloud of the Divine displeasure hangs over 
our country, it is " our iniquities that have separated 
between us and our God." When the apprehension of 
imminent evils drives us to consider what methods 
of relief or security we can adopt, shall we rely on 
human strength, and forget that " the Lord's hand is 
not shortened that it cannot save, neither his ear 
heavy that it cannot hear " ] In all which has pro- 
ceeded from the tongues or pens of the North within 
this fortnight, that has come under my eye, I have seen 
nothing in which I have felt a more hearty concur- 
rence than in what was said by the minister of the 
Mount Vernon church, on the last Sunday afternoon. 
If one or another sentence in that discourse might be 
amended, its purpose and tone claim more than com- 



6 



mendation, — they invite imitation ; and if I can lead 
you, my friends, to the same exercises of penitence and 
prayer to which it was his desire to conduct his hear- 
ers, I shall speak as I ought at this time. 

I anticipate the admonition, not to trespass on 
party ground. The preacher should not lead his con- 
gregation through the turbid waters of political strife, 
it is said : and I both accept and approve the restric- 
tion. But is it not one of the most lamentable errors 
into which a people can fall, that they refuse to take 
such subjects as demand our present consideration 
out of the warfare of temporary interests I What ! 
questions that lay hold on the first principles of per- 
sonal duty and social order ; questions that relate to 
the very existence of liberty, and the preservation of 
government, — those mutually suggestive ideas and 
mutually dependent facts ; questions that embrace 
great moral issues ; — to be treated as mere portions 
of party policy, and be dragged from their majestic 
importance to become the materials out of which 
ambition shall construct the steps by which it may 
climb to eminence ! No, no ! Upon such questions, 
the people should disown all ties but those which 
bind them to justice and honor. There should be no 
consent of a party to the commission of crime, or the 
perpetration of outrage. Any party should be 
ashamed of complicity with brutal violence; every 
man should hasten to disclaim sympathy with an 
assault on the safeguards of freedom and the rights of 



humanity. We go behind the divisions which pre- 
ference for this or that man, or this or that measure, 
creates, to the truths on which the institutions that 
we all value rest as their only support, when we call 
upon our hearers to discountenance the substitution 
of injury for argument, or of brute force for legal 
restraint. 

The party spirit which is so rife in this country, 
and which falls like a mildew on every generous im- 
pulse, while it puts fetters on all independent action, 
stands in the double relation of effect and cause to a 
yet greater evil under which we suffer ; far greater, 
because it is the most disastrous of all evils, whether 
for an individual or for a community to cherish. I 
mean the banishment of moral and religious convic- 
tions from practical life. We are not practically a 
Christian nation, nor even a nation of theists. 
Though not guilty of an open denial of God, yet, in 
the primitive sense of the word, as " without God in 
the world," we are atheists. While avoiding a direct 
avowal of infidelity, we treat both Christian rules 
and Christian sentiments with a neglect that is equi- 
valent to unbelief Especially does this disregard of 
the considerations by which the mind should be 
governed appear in our political action. How few 
bring their decision upon the support they shall give 
or refuse to a measure of the government, or to a can- 
didate for office, under the light which faith in any 
thing above or beyond this world would throw upon it ! 



Because the Church neither receives the patronage of 
the State nor attempts to control the State by any 
direct action, it seems to be thought that the Church 
and the State have nothing in common ; as if the 
truths which have built up the one were not the basis 
of the other. Every question that enters into the 
history of civil government has a moral and religious 
side. Does a war with England, or with any coun- 
try, cast its gigantic shadow over our future prospe- 
rity'? The statesman or the private citizen, who, in 
forming his opinion upon the propriety of such a con- 
flict of national forces, leaves out of view the antago- 
nism between war and the spirit of the gospel, omits 
the most important element of a correct judgment. 
Is the extension of Slavery beyond the bounds within 
which its noxious influence is now felt, attempted 1 
That any one may determine upon the right course 
for him to pursue in reference to this subject, he 
must take into account the effects of such an institu- 
tion upon the character alike of the master and of 
the slave. Are the use of deadly weapons, and a 
resort to dastardly violence, encouraged by the exam- 
ple of men holding seats in the national Legislature ? 
The morality of the land, surely, is not bound to keep 
silence, lest it should meddle with matters that do 
not lie within its province ; for what amidst all the 
forms of human wickedness may be exposed by 
the religious teacher, if such conduct must pass with- 
out his rebuke 1 Even if it were true that the ordi- 



nary business of government has no religious 
connections, whenever selfishness and passion become 
dominant influences, when the sanctity of law is 
contemned and the essential rights of freemen are 
invaded, when rapine and murder are the methods 
used to adjust political differences, the Christian who 
does not speak in behalf of righteousness is disloyal 
to his Master. There are some offences which, as 
they do not admit of palliation, forbid silence. We 
may lament the introduction into Congressional 
debate of a style of personal recrimination as ill suited 
to any good end, as it is inconsistent with Senatorial 
dignity ; but no discourtesy of the tongue can excuse 
the arm lifted with a deliberate purpose of vengeance. 
The want of moral and religious principle in those 
who are the chosen guardians of the public interests 
should humble us to the dust ; for they represent 
either the sentiment or the negligence of the people, 
without whose active or passive consent such men 
could not have the opportunity of abusing high 
trusts. The political profligacy of the times falls 
back upon the people, as the authors of the downward 
course which we are treading. There is too little 
fear of God in their hearts, and too little love of 
righteousness. A nation cannot prosper which denies 
to moral considerations their proper influence over 
public affairs. 

The tendencies which are manifesting themselves 
among us cannot but be unfavorable to the conti- 

2 



10 



nuance of our free institutions. These institutions 
are not in themselves immortal, nor inaccessible to 
harm. They are not made of adamant or granite ; 
their strength lies in the character of the people. 
Nothing can endanger their stability more than the 
indulgence, on the one hand, of ambitious, selfish, 
and violent tempers vrithin the present boundaries of 
the republic; or, on the other hand, an enlargement 
of our territory without regard to the justice of the 
acquisition or to the previous condition of those 
T^hom such enlargement may bring into the Union. 
An insane passion for unlimited growth is tempting 
us to place both our external and our internal rela- 
tions m jeopardy. We are greedy of success, and, if 
not unscrupulous, are impatient in regard to the 
means. We thu-st for dominion, and covet the exer- 
cise of an influence that may bring us into collision 
with the Powers of the Old World; instead of enjoying 
the immunity from European jealousies and conflicts 
which our situation might afford us. We abound in 
self-conceit, and claim an admiration to which we 
show ourselves but poorly entitled. We are growing 
passionate, turbulent, savage, profane. With all the 
expense that is lavished on education, and all 
the benevolent agencies that are established, we are 
losing refinement of manners, disparaging intellectual 
culture, fostering habits of extravagance, counte- 
nancing luxury and display, and precipitating our- 
selves upon a change in our moral condition which 



11 



must materially affect our political state. Virtue and 
piety are the defences of popular government. Let 
them be broken down, and the best constructed sys- 
tem of organized liberty will be precarious. It can 
last but a little time without justice towards man 
and faith towards God. 

One effect of the example which we are now present- 
ing is, to discredit the theory of our institutions abroad. 
In the Divine providence, the experiment of intrust- 
ing a people with the task and risk and glory of 
self-government was committed to us for the instruc- 
tion of the world. Never was such a responsible 
position held by a people before; never such an 
opportunity enjoyed of benefiting mankind. Through 
the years of our weakness and youth, while we fell 
into some mistakes, we on the whole sustained the 
burthen, which it was an honor to bear, with dignity 
and success. Gradually the contempt of the old des- 
potisms was turned into respect or fear, the hopes of 
those who sighed for emancipation from tyranny in 
Europe were inflamed by admiration of our career, 
the infant republic took its place among the great 
Powers of the earth ; and moderation and discretion 
alone were needed to have made our history a light 
that would have guided the Eastern continent into 
the enjoyment of constitutional liberty, if not of 
republican government. But with our prosperity we 
became self-sufficient, immoral, and reckless. In the 
spectacle which our public affairs have offered to 



12 



the nations, they have beheld a retrograde civilization. 
Our boasted superiority is sinking into a fierce law- 
lessness ; our legislation has become unprincipled, 
our policy grown rapacious ; our prominent men 
distinguish themselves by acts that would be disre- 
putable in private life ; the institution which, at the 
commencement of our Union, though a palpable con- 
tradiction of the fundamental principle of our political 
order, was permitted to remain because its decay was 
thought to be sure and to be safer than its immediate 
eradication, has increased in visible magnitude, and 
still more in secret influence, till it overshadows the 
whole land ; violence stalks through the chambers of 
the capitol, and civil war is already enkindled on the 
borders of the republic ; — and what must now be 
the effect of our example abroad, but to fill the hearts 
of good men with disappointment, and to animate the 
supporters of monarchical and aristocratical institu- 
tions with proud exultation ? Why should they not 
exult '? They see enough to dispel the fears that 
were once inspired as they looked across the Atlantic, 
and are waiting for our downfall to read a lesson on 
the inefficiency of popular government, which cen- 
turies may not erase from the memories of men. O 
my country ! how unwise, how unfaithful, hast thou 
been ! 

The effect upon ourselves of our misuse of the 
position in which we were placed, as a people with 
whom liberty and law should have been co-ordinate 



13 



terms, is seen in the loosened morality which pervades 
the land. Look into our cities, and you find a luxu- 
riance of vice such as indicates a rich soil left without 
the care that might have made it productive of the 
most substantial harvest. From the villages which 
were once the seats of Puritanic propriety we receive 
painful intelligence of crime, besides many a tale that 
marks a want of religious restraint. The great West 
heaves with its excess of life, suspended as it were 
between a magnificent destiny and an ignoble materi- 
alism. Polygamy has planted its homes in the fertile 
plains that were an unknown region a few years ago, 
and Paganism has erected its altars of idolatrous wor- 
ship on the shores of the Pacific, Honest and able 
men prefer the retirement of private life, to an expo- 
sure of character and person amidst the vulgar pas- 
sions that infest the scenes of public duty ; and, worse 
than all, the people are losing their faith in freedom, 
in goodness, and in God. Life is becoming a scram- 
ble for outward success ; politics are given over to 
unworthy management; and, unless some check be 
provided, the future pages of our history will describe 
the decadence and fall of the noblest structure ever 
raised by human hands. 

In this picture of national disaster, one circumstance 
is especially suited to create gloomy apprehension. 
The country is divided on a question of sectional in- 
terest. In former times, the division has been kept 
more or less clear of this fearful issue. Now it is 



14 



brought to a direct struggle between the North and 
the South. One or the other must yield. Each says 
it has made all the concession it will make ; each 
speaks of the injustice it has received in the past, and 
spreads its angry menace over the future. I am not 
now considering which of these antagonists has right 
or strength on its side. Each believes it has both 
strength and right. What, to human view, must fol- 
low but open contention, — the arbitrament of the 
battle-field '? I know that it is common at the North 
to deride the threats of the South, as an attempt at 
intimidation, which will be relinquished the moment 
it shall fail of its purpose. But they who reason in 
this manner forget that pride and passion do not take 
counsel of sound judgment. The South will not 
pause to calculate consequences. When what it 
calls its honor is assailed, and what it holds to be its 
chief interest is endangered, it will prefer defeat to 
submission. The history of the world has been writ- 
ten in vain, if it do not teach us that men will fight 
rather than yield, though the chances of success be 
all against them. The temper of the South is despe- 
rate, as well as arrogant. The leaders of opinion 
there may be few, but determination does not wait 
to count numbers. 

What, then, is before us^ Perhaps a civil war, 
the first spark of which, struck in a territory but 
yesterday unsettled, may wrap the whole country in its 
fiery surges. Are we prepared for this ^ Some there 



15 



are who answer, Yes, let it come ; and others who 
say. It never will come. To the latter I reply. Your 
confidence may be misplaced ; and to the former, 
Your decision betrays more of impetuosity than of 
thoughtfulness. Have you remembered how much 
war always causes of suffering and sin 1 Have you 
considered that no war is so internecine, because no 
hatred is so intense, as that in which former friends 
are arrayed as enemies'? Have you anticipated the 
miseries that must ensue, for years and years, when 
fraternal relations shall have been converted, by an 
enforced peace, into smothered but burning desires for 
revenge ? Have you brought before your imagination 
the world's discouragement, when this fair heritage of 
constitutional freedom shall have been drenched in 
fratricidal blood ? " Bombastic extravagance," may be 
the only reply that some persons will give. Not so, 
my friends. Not a word in the sentences I have just 
spoken goes beyond the inevitable truth. I ask the 
Christian to ponder well his meaning, when he talks 
of bloodshed as if it were but a display of military 
lines on our Common. War is the last resort of civil- 
ized man, if it should ever be the means adopted by 
a Christian people for the maintenance of their rights. 
I do not say, that, in the final extremity, whether for 
an individual, or a nation, or the oppressed part of a 
nation, self-defence, though through blood, is not 
a duty ; but it then derives its justification from the 
irresistible instincts of our nature. The bold talk 



16 



about fighting before the awful necessity comes, and 
thousands of miles from the scene of peril, has a very- 
different sound from that voice which speaks only in 
the last emergency. I read with sadness the language 
of Christian men and Christian ministers, whose brave 
words, if they be well considered, are bloody words. 
To me, the musket and the Bible do not seem twin 
implements of civilization. 

With or without war, the tempers which now pre- 
sent their hostile fronts to each other may, and if not 
in some way or other appeased must, sunder the 
Union. Well, say many who a few years ago would 
not even listen to a suggestion so painful, that is not 
the greatest of evils. I admit it is not. I admit that 
we may be driven to this as the part of the alterna- 
tive, which alone we can take and keep clear con- 
sciences before God and man. But I do affirm, — and 
every one who thinks soberly will agree with me, — 
that this will be a lamentable conclusion of a history, 
the first chapter of which is bright with the names of 
Washington and his compeers. The dissolution 
of this Union of States may not be the greatest of 
evils, but is it not next to the greatest ? Is it not 
an evil which we should deprecate, and to prevent 
which we should be ready to sacrifice every thing but 
truth and right "? I cannot think of such a termina- 
tion of American freedom without tears that the heart 
weeps, if they do not flow down the cheeks. It is 
easy to flout at such emotion, and easier still, but not 



1' 



more kind nor more honorable, to represent such 
feelmg as sympathy with the slaveholder ; but no 
wish to avoid misrepresentation so gratuitous and 
unjust shall deter me from confessing, that I can con- 
template the overthrow of this Union only with fear 
and grief. Let the alternative involved in the rela- 
tions of Slavery to the Union be brought before me 
under circumstances which compel me, if I cling to 
the one, to encourage the other, and I shall know 
that God has called me to the sad duty of helping 
to destroy the citadel of the world's hope. But, till I 
see that duty too plain to be mistaken, I will pray 
that it may not be made the test of my submission to 
a solemn and dark Providence. 

Shall we, then, give way to despair, or indolently 
wait for the Divine will to be unfolded in events 
whose purpose we cannot misapprehend ^ No. That 
is not the counsel of a believing or a patriotic heart, 
of one who loves freedom, or whose " hope is in the 
Lord." Never may we despair, when the great inte- 
rests of humanity are at stake ; never doubt that a 
way will be opened for the success of just principles 
and the preservation of good institutions. Be watchful 
to detect the first sign of duty, and ready to obey the 
first call to action that shall come from a higher wis- 
dom than that of man. Be patient till the hour 
comes; be prompt when it comes; be firm while it 
lasts. 

It has come, I am told. I know not but it has. I 



18 



do believe that we are in a more critical situation 
than ever before since our present form of govern- 
ment was inaugurated. But I think, that if the hour 
of final decision had come, we should see, more clearly 
than we now see, what we must do. The country is 
agitated, perplexed, distressed. At such a time, our 
trust must be, not in man, but in God ; the light that 
shall illuminate our path must be sent from Above. 
This is the time for humble and penitent thought, for 
deep searching of the spirit within us rather than 
for passionate declamation, for earnest calmness rather 
than for superficial vehemence. Never was there a 
time when self-control was more important, difficult 
though it be ; never a time, when one should be more 
studious that his speech be just as well as frank. 
This is no time for fraudulent words, and no time 
for rash acts. If in a single sentence now uttered I 
have departed from the gravity of a most momentous 
theme, I have been false to my purpose. I have 
wished, my friends, to show you the urgency of the 
requisition, which, in view of the fearful possibilities 
with which we are encompassed, enjoins upon us 
serious and deliberate preparation for whatever a day 
or a year may bring forth. Let every one be in ear- 
nest, and let every one feel the solemnity of the period. 
God grant that when our injured Senator shall return 
to the seat whence he was stricken down by a cow- 
ardly blow, and the country shall wait in eager solici- 
tude for his vindication of the rights of free speech 



19 



and the privileges of Congressional debate, while by 
his manly eloquence he shall awaken shame and 
remorse in hearts that need to feel such pangs, he 
may say nothing which the severest wisdom shall not 
approve ! God grant that the persecuted citizens of 
Kansas may not forget, that, if self-defence be a law 
of nature, retaliation is a breach of the gospel ! God 
give us all, the discernment and the determination 
which the exigency demands ! 

God give them to us, I say ; for from Him alone 
can we receive the light or the support which we 
need. To Him must we look. His "arm is not 
shortened, that it cannot save ; neither his ear heavy, 
that it cannot hear." Human counsel at a time like 
this is insufficient. It is poor and impotent. To 
God must we turn, in sorrow and in faith ; to the God 
of our fathers, to Him who has been our God through 
all the past, to Him who will never leave us without 
assistance if we ask for it. He may have permitted 
us to be surrounded by these anxieties, that we might 
feel our helplessness and turn to Him. This is the 
time for lowly and importunate prayer. Better than 
the crowded hall is the closet of secret supplication ; 
wiser than the noisy assembly, the devout congrega- 
tion. There need not be less of bravery because there 
is more of piety, less of righteous indignation because 
there is more of humble confession, nor less love of 
freedom because there is more reliance on God. 
Prayer should be on all our lips, and in all our 



20 



hearts. There should be personal intercession and 
united petition. We should pray for our rulers, for 
our legislators, for our fellow-citizens, for ourselves. 
We should cast our country upon the Divine care, 
which will not refuse to accept the burthen. O 
my God ! guide us, help us, save us, for the sake of 
that loving-kindness which Thou didst show to our 
fathers, and for the sake of that compassion which 
Thou hast for all thy creatures. Forgive the sins 
which we have committed, and grant us true repent- 
ance. Dispel the darkness that overhangs, and 
remove the fears that beset us. Allay the jealousies 
and subdue the animosities that separate us from 
Thee, as well as from one another. Let freedom and 
peace and union be the watchwords of the whole 
land, while the people shall walk together in the 
obedience of thy commandments and under the pro- 
tection of thy holy name. Hear this our prayer, for 
thy great mercy's sake ! Amen. 




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